1869–1941 · United Kingdom · 20th century
Henry Walford Davies (1869–1941) was a British composer, organist and teacher. From 1934 he held the post of Master of the King's Music, and from 1924 to 1941 he spoke about music on BBC radio. For a player he is of interest as the author of songs for voice and piano and of hymn tunes.
Henry Walford Davies was born at Oswestry, a town in Shropshire, on 6 September 1869. His parents were John Whitridge Davies and his wife Susan (née Gregory); he was the seventh of their nine children and the youngest of the four sons to survive.
His father worked as an accountant but loved music: he founded a choral society in Oswestry, conducted it, and also led the choir at Christ Church, a Congregational church. Walford sang in that choir, and his brothers Charlie and Harold were later organists there. Harold Davies was a professor of music at Adelaide University from 1919 to 1947.
In 1882 the organist Sir George Elvey took Walford into the choir of St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle.
Davies's voice broke in 1885, and he left the choir. He was given the post of organist at All Saints, the royal chapel in Windsor Great Park, and also acted as secretary to Walter Parratt, who followed Elvey, and to Randall Davidson, then dean and later an archbishop.
In those days British universities, Cambridge included, awarded music degrees that were not tied to a college, and any candidate who passed the exams could receive one. Davies sat the Cambridge bachelor of music exams in 1889, but the cantata he submitted, The Future (words by Matthew Arnold), failed. Charles Villiers Stanford, who was professor of music at Cambridge, encouraged him to try again. The second attempt worked, and he graduated in 1891.
A composition scholarship took Davies to the Royal College of Music in London in 1890, and he remained a student until 1894. Hubert Parry was his composition teacher, with Stanford for one term; W. S. Rockstro taught him counterpoint, Herbert Sharpe the piano and Haydn Inwards the violin.
As a student he was organist for three months at the church of St George on Campden Hill, then for a year at St Anne's Church, Soho, which he left in 1891 on grounds of ill health. The next year Davies took the organ at Christ Church, Hampstead, staying until 1897. Between 1895 and 1903 he taught counterpoint at the college, filling the place Rockstro had left.
In 1896 Davies did not pass the counterpoint paper of the Cambridge doctor of music examination and weighed up leaving his counterpoint teaching post. He passed on the second attempt, though, and received the doctorate in March 1898.
In May 1898 Davies took charge of the organ and the choir of the Temple Church, in London's City, and stayed until 1923. Jeremy Dibble, his biographer, sees this appointment as the point from which Davies came to be regarded as a leading name in British musical life.
Both as a performer and as a teacher, he made a name for himself on the organ, and Leopold Stokowski was one of his pupils. Davies conducted as well: he ran the London Church Choir Association in 1901–13 and the Bach Choir in 1902–07, where Stanford had been his predecessor.
Davies had his greatest success as a composer in 1904 with the cantata Everyman, based on a 15th-century morality play of that name. It was received warmly, and in the years that followed many of the country's choral societies performed it. The cantata was heard in Australia and the United States as well.
In the First World War Davies served on a wartime music committee chaired by Parry, arranged concerts for soldiers in France and took part in musical events organised by the Fight for Right movement. The RAF appointed him its director of music in 1918, with the rank of major.
In that role he set up a music school for the service together with two bands, and wrote the RAF March Past. A slow middle section, the trio, came later, from Major George Dyson, who took over from him.
Davies accepted a music professorship at University College, Aberystwyth, in 1919. With it came leadership of music for Wales's national university and he led the National Council of Music as chairman. In 1922 he received a knighthood, in the honours list marking David Lloyd George's resignation.
The year 1924 was a busy one for Davies. He delivered the Cramb lectures in Glasgow, gave a first talk on BBC radio and took the Gresham chair of music in the University of London. That year he also married Constance Margaret Isabel Evans, whose father, the Rev. William Evans, was the rector of Narberth in Pembrokeshire.
Davies gave up his Aberystwyth chair in 1926, and in that same year the BBC appointed him a music adviser. He kept chairing the National Council of Music till his death. From 1927 to 1932 he was organist and director of music at St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle.
Through radio Davies became widely known. His 1926–9 programmes went under the title "Music and the Ordinary Listener"; he also made wartime talks for children (1939–41), plus the series "Everyman's Music", which ran from 1940 to 1941. His first radio talk came in April 1924, and he went on broadcasting until 1941.
Elgar died in 1934, and Davies succeeded him in the post of Master of the King's Music. In 1939, as the Second World War began, the BBC's symphony orchestra and its music administration were relocated to Bristol, and Davies, being the corporation's music adviser, moved there from London.
Davies died at Wrington, close to Bristol, on 11 March 1941. His ashes were buried in the cathedral graveyard at Bristol.
Davies worked as a composer, organist and teacher. Three works are named as the best known: Solemn Melody, the RAF March Past and the piece God Be In My Head. God Be In My Head was written by him at Witham Hall.
Since 1930 Solemn Melody has often served as mourning music at the Cenotaph in Whitehall on Remembrance Sunday. His greatest success as a composer came in 1904, with the cantata Everyman. Hymn tunes are also among his output: Temple, for John Brownlie's hymn "O King enthroned on high" (No. 421 in the New English Hymnal), and Oswald's Tree (the name is tied to Oswestry, his birthplace), for John Newton's hymn "Great Shepherd of thy people, hear".
Davies left a mark as more than a composer. As an organist he was known for his playing and for his teaching, and he was also known for the radio talks about music that he gave between 1924 and 1941. He was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire and a Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order.
The site has eight of Davies's songs for voice and piano. At an intermediate level are "A Tragedy" and "A little old Man". At an upper intermediate level are "An old Cradle Song", "The Apology", "Bless you" and "The fly and the humble bee". At an advanced level are "O my little sixpence" and "Old Woman". You can begin with the first two, which are of intermediate level, the easiest among these scores.